The present invention relates generally to a coin handling system for gaming machines and, more particularly, to a coin handing system having a dedicated local microcontroller for handing low-level operations associated with the handling of coins input to the gaming machine.
A conventional gaming machine receives coins input to the machine by a player such as a casino patron. The coins input to the gaming machine are processed by a coin mechanism which comprises a coin chute to receive coins, a coin accepting mechanism to validate the coins, and an optical gate to monitor the timing and the direction of coin travel. The validation of the coins by the coin accepting mechanism includes determining whether the correct coins or tokens were input to the gaming machine, generating an electronic pulse when the coins are determined to be valid, and routing a coin to a xe2x80x9cvalidxe2x80x9d coin chute when deemed valid, or routing an invalid coin to an xe2x80x9cinvalidxe2x80x9d coin chute when deemed invalid. The coin accepting mechanism and the optical gate are under the control of a central processing unit (xe2x80x9cCPUxe2x80x9d). The CPU includes coin handling driver software that continuously monitors the coin accepting mechanism and the optical gates. The coin accepting mechanism and the optical gates are interrupt driven devices which produce electrical signals indicative of the acceptance of a coin and the passage of the coin through the optical gate. The time difference between the acceptance of a coin by the coin accepting mechanism and the passage of the coin though the optical gate is measured. Once the optical gates are open by a passing coin, the electrical signals produced by the optical gates are periodically sampled in the order of many tens of times per second until the coin has passed though the optical gates thus closing the optical gates. A coin which is accepted by the coin accepting mechanism and passes through the optical gate in a timely manner is credited to the gaming machine. Because the CPU must perform a variety of other tasks, its overall performance is diminished by having to perform low-level coin handling operations in addition to these other tasks. The performance of the CPU is further diminished in xe2x80x9cfast feedingxe2x80x9d situations wherein a player inputs several coins to the gaming machine in a small period of time.
To overcome the aforementioned drawback, the present invention provides a coin handing system having a dedicated local microcontroller that assumes the low-level coin handing operations previously performed by the CPU in a conventional gaming machine. Because the local microcontroller performs the low-level coin handing operations, the CPU is free to provide better performance to other tasks.
In one embodiment of the present invention, a gaming machine comprises a CPU and a coin handling system. The CPU operates a gaming machine in response to a wager. The coin handling system includes a coin accepting mechanism, a detector, and a local microcontroller distinct from and coupled to the CPU. The coin handling system is coupled to and monitors the status of the coin accepting mechanism and the detector for electronic signals indicative of the intake of coins.
The CPU issues high-level commands related to the game play of the gaming machine. The high-level commands may, for example, include querying for coin acceptance status and commanding the coin handling system to accept or not to accept coins. However, to free up the CPU for other tasks, the local microcontroller performs low-level coin handling system operations related to the acceptance of coins. The low-level coin handing system operations may include, for example, sampling the state of the coin accepting mechanism and the detector, performing calculations, and responding with commands instructing the CPU to credit the coins to the game.